New Media Medicine Forums - Medical News

Posted: 01 Jul 2014 02:00 AM PDT

Morning everyone!

I'm a new member of this forum and have to say I am very impressed with its friendly atmosphere and supportive members, provides a lovely contrast to the way that sometimes both the internet and medicine are portrayed!

Despite this, I am actually looking for you as a community to provide a short sharp wake up call for me, as I seem to be putting myself in a very strange position. I am 32 years old, happily married with 2 kids (5 and 1 and a half), with a well paid job where I am fairly senior in my organisation. However, I have been plagued for some time now with a nagging feeling that I want to explore a career in medicine. It is quite possibly a silly early onset mid-life crisis and I should just go out and buy a motorbike, however despite my best efforts I am seemingly unable to stop it. Being lucky enough to have a very supportive wife I finally plucked up the courage to discuss it with her, and instead of laughing or rolling her eyes, she has encouraged me to explore what, if anything, might be possible.

And this is where I am looking for your honest, supportive yet decisive feedback as I suspect that I have chosen to have this choice rather too late in life - not due to age, as I have been very inspired by some of the stories on this forum of mature students doing amazing things; but more in terms of whether access to medicine is rather out of my reach.

To give the background, I live in Scotland and currently work for a voluntary organisation. I do have a degree in Education but it isn't worth the paper it was printed on - illness at the time meant that I achieved a plain old BEd without my honours. My school grades were decent but obviously rather out of date now, and even at the time I achieved an A at Biology at Higher, but dropped Chemistry after getting a 1 at Standard Grade. It seems to me, therefore, that I have very little of relevance to medicine, yet probably too much for me to get access to a course such as that run through Stow/Kelvin College.

Apologies for the rather 'woe-is-me' approach, but is there any way forward that my fellow forumites can see in this situation, or am I deluding myself? I had wondered about going back down the Highers/A-levels route, but not sure whether they would be considered relevant for someone older.

Thanks in advance for your help, and thanks to everyone for the contribution that you all make to this forum, it really is inspirational to someone like me.